


derealisation

by nimrodcracker



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic
Genre: Everyone Needs A Hug, F/M, Miraluka Jedi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-22
Updated: 2015-06-22
Packaged: 2018-04-05 15:37:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4185330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nimrodcracker/pseuds/nimrodcracker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What's to say that he isn't still there?</p>
<p>Set after Chapter 2.</p>
            </blockquote>





	derealisation

**Author's Note:**

> So I had a thought - if Miraluka perceive the world though the Force alone, wouldn't it be harder for them to differentiate between places? At least on the surface. Hence making the people around them a critical marker in their awareness.

_Caeomhal._

He doesn't see as they do: splashes of colour on physical shapes, jutting out from the surrounding landscape like bumps on a dewback's scaly hide.

What all Miraluka see are distant lights against solid colour - sometimes gray, sometimes black, but always in binary. Much like now, his mental picture of Corellia's bombed-out streets is cast in gray, and nothing but gray, with faint lights on the edge of his consciousness.

_Caeomhal._

There used to be more presences in that visual map of his, be it Sith, Imps or thugs alike. He doesn't _see_  them, rather, he sees their malevolence, and that gives form to those figures in his mind. They manifest as crimson blips in his mental radar, but they're not there anymore. Now, it's just him and the acerbic stench of cauterised limbs, and suddenly he imagines his surroundings to be dreadfully bleak, like a painting drained of colour.

_Caeomhal._

That's how the Emperor's Fortress felt to him - lifeless, stagnant, _vile_. Bereft of the chorus of the living, devoid of the intricate web of movement that the Force is in its purest form. It is a place _abhorrent_ to his very nature, and he knows it is a small mercy that he remembers so little of his time there.

He stiffens, his mind awash with the crippling sense of deja vu. The warzones of today are no better than that accursed place. What's to say that he isn't still there?

Suddenly, that nightmare isn't as far away as he thinks it is.

"Why the face, tough guy? The stench putting you off?"

Teasing. Her tone is playful, as usual, dripping with the lightheartedness that never fails to tickle the laughter out of his throat.

But not today.

_Caeomhal._

His name is what the Emperor whispers, forever and always. Slithering in his mind, clouding his vision and freezing the blood in his veins with the very sound of _his_ voice.

The knobs of his lightsaber dig into his palms - _painfully_ , and he wonders how it hasn't bent out of shape yet.

He mutters the same few words, always like a scared child, and unlike the Jedi he is. "Am I still there?"

He hates it, sounding so small, because that isn't what he is supposed to be, not when the Republic's counting on them - on _him_ , to drag it out of this cycle of never-ending defeats and mounting casualties. Far too many people have placed their faith in him, now. The stakes are simply too high for him to fail them.

_Caeomhal._

She doesn't disappoint, even with the grime and smoke clinging on his robes. Catching him off-guard, she hugs him fiercely, as if touch alone could stave off his fear.

Like always, the air is squeezed out of his lungs, her hands a vice around his chest, and head a deadweight on his shoulder.

Being roughened up like this makes him uncomfortable, because private space means much to him, but he isn't complaining this time.

All he will sense is _her_ : Force presence commanding his attention like a splash of colour against the grayness, blotting out that dark presence that had shoved itself into the back of his mind.

Moments like these, he thinks he can picture her, like how Doc and Rusk and Scourge do. The spark in her eyes, that smirk between her cheeks, her chin turned up in defiance - seemingly _goading_  others to knock her down.

Those are the things he adores about her, but those are the things that are denied to him. 

He has yet to make peace with that, and doubts he ever will.

"You're not." Her voice will always be muffled, what with her head nestled on his shoulders, but he knows she would look him in the eyes if he had any.

The calmness pours from her in waves, wrapping around him like a warm blanket. He clings to it like a shivering man.

"He can't hurt you here," she says firmly, not loosening her grip in the slightest. "Because I'm here."

He doesn't need eyes to see that she means it with every fiber of her being.

She is the bedrock, he is the mountain: with her, he towers over the creeping darkness like the champion he is, without her, he is but a man, fearful of the shadows over his shoulder, of voices that threaten to twist him against himself.

The Emperor will return to torment him, that's for certain, but he knows she will be there with him every step of the way, just like he had for her, when the Emperor had been mucking about in her mind.

That thought alone leaves a warm fuzziness in his chest.

For now, he simply savours the feeling of holding her close in their little bubble, an oasis of calm surrounded by the chaos in Corellia's streets. It is a simple gesture, but that's what they can get thus far - stolen moments, so far and few in between.

It is enough for him - for the both of them.

He shifts his head to rest his chin on her head, his fingers tracing circles in her back. The beginnings of a _thank you_  rumble in his throat, but she cuts him off with a thought.

_I know,_ she whispers in his mind, and he knows she's smiling.

He simply chuckles, holding her closer to him.


End file.
